The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1887-10-13
Secondary Value of Crops.


When farmers plant or SOW crop. it is usual
" with the expectation that it will directly
turn certain amount of profit. either by sale
or by home cousum ption. The side advantages
to be derived from it. its effect upon the land,
not always taken sufficiently into the &C.
count. Take the crop of corn fodder an ex-
ample. sown exclusively for the winter feed
which it affords, equal to FIVE six tons of we'll
dried fodder il to be fed in this state or from
twelve to twenty tons OF green stalks, if to be
cut fine for the silo. The other benefits to be
obtained by its cultivation too much over
looked This crop may be used powerful
extirpator of perennial running or annual weeds.
thisties, They have taken posses
sion of the ground, and about
growth. just before blowing, turn them COM
pletely under with the aid of weed hook or
chain. Make the fresh service mellow with the
Acme harrow other suitable i'm plemenf and
corn in burrows or drills at the rate of one
or two bushels an acre. and far enough apart to
admit the passage CT narrow cultivator. To
keep down annual weeds. kill them by the
thorough use OF the smoothing harrow, before
the weeds come up. and again by its
when the corn is only a few inches high. 1t will
clean out all small weeds in the rows of corn
among the stalks. Then let the common Guilt
vator run every few days between the rows, I'M
Ill the leaves of the crop are tall enough to
when they will soon shade everything
below By the time the fodder ID cut. in Sep
TENDER. the Canada thistles will present very
feeble appearance, and quack grass, II 1t has
obtained possession. will be nearly extirpated
by the dense shade of the compact corn crop,
and this result has cost nothing but the positive
need of the corr itself in good culture A repe
tition another year. if it does not entirely de-
stroy such weeds. will make the labor small for
their subsequent destruction. If the work has
been properly done. the owner cannot fail TO be
gratiied, when he cuts the corn, at the perfectly
clean surface which the well-cultivated ground
will present. about smooth aud clear of weeds
as the centre of a well travelled highway.
The red clover is another crop which has
more than valuable quality. Every farmer
knows its use for grazing and for the manu-
facture of nutritive hay-nutritlve. If cured
without becoming wet. Its value loosener
of the soil may be very distinctly understood by
seeding down with clover one portion of field
having strong and heavy SOIL and the other
portion with timothy alone. When in the
course of two years this field is plowed for corn,
the clover sod will turn mp crunn bled pulver-
ICED surface; the timothy sod will turn
solid as an un burned brick Still another valu-
able side use of clover is it's aid in REFRESHING the
growth of weeds through the agency of its dense
foliage in smothering them. 1t has thus proved
efficient, particularly in eradcating ox-eye
daisv. In a region of country where the
fields were almost as white snow with it, an
energetic farmer had nearly cleared mis- farm OF
this pestiient weed by the luxuriant and COM
pact crops of clover which he was successful in
raising. The clover crop has still another excel
lent IN crit which adds further to it's value. This
is the richness of its manural quality. in which
it approaches good barnyard manure.
These instances are furnished merely as ex-